While digital commerce is rapidly shifting, it’s nice to know there's a constant in the retail industry. The Internet Retailer Conference & Exhibition (IRCE) delivers a great event every year packed with cutting-edge content, thoughtful conversations, and predictions about the ever-changing future of online retailing.

In fact, in his opening presentation, IRCE’s Kurt Peters spoke about some of the current and future trends which resonated with retailers and technology teams alike. Peters noted that Amazon.com alone accounts for 80 percent of e-commerce growth, and that brick-and-mortar stores are closing at an unprecedented rate, with over 8,600 store closings expected by the end of 2017. Due to these trends, the points of interaction in commerce are changing and going beyond store, desktop and mobile to shopping and transacting by voice with augmented reality and, eventually, virtual reality. This will likely result in a technical transformation that will bring a nexus to services that provides retailers the flexibility they need to innovate quickly to keep up with an ever-changing and complex e-commerce ecosystem.

What was the overall theme throughout the conference? Creating a fantastic and engaging shopper experience is the most important driver for online revenue growth. Many of the conference sessions featured successful retailers educating attendees about how adding third-party e-commerce technologies help achieve optimal shopper experiences.